“In places like this, it's hard to imagine that the world can be so ugly,' Thomas said. 'This is how it was meant to be,' Priya replied. 'The ugliness is our own fault.”

“How beautiful the world is, and how ugly labyrinths are,' I said, relieved.'How beautiful the world would be if there was a procedure for moving through labyrinths,' my master replied.”

“Clawing its way towards us, the ugliness of the world tore away our hiding-place.”

“But you're beautiful, and the beautiful should be given whatever they want.""Hey, what about the ugly ones?""The ugly ones." She poked her tongue out. "It's their fault if their ugly. They're to be blamed, not pitied.”

“Only in relation to our imagination can things be called beautiful or ugly, well-ordered or confused”

“I would like travelers, especially American travelers, to travel in a way that broadens their perspective, because I think Americans tend to be some of the most ethnocentric people on the planet. It's not just Americans, it's the big countries. It's the biggest countries that tend to be ethnocentric or ugly. There are ugly Russians, ugly Germans, ugly Japanese and ugly Americans. You don't find ugly Belgians or ugly Bulgarians, they're just too small to think the world is their norm.”